infierno en francisco de quevedo

The Dialectics of Redemption. AutonomousLanguage, Heresy and Divine Truth in Franciscode Quevedo’s Dream of Hell

Sofie Kluge, University of Copenhagen

The present article proposes a reading of ‘El sueno del infierno’that may clarify the connection between at least some of thediverse elements of Quevedo’s strange world, concentrating on therelation between his ubiquitous awareness of the arbitrarity ofhuman language — separated from divine truth after the Fall, andhence autonomous — and his quest for authoritative metaphysicalmeaning.

Man is the shadow of a dream. (Pindar, Pythian Odes, 8.135)

I. Introduction

In 1627 the final edition of a collection of early prose compositions by the

Spanish Golden Age writer Francisco de Quevedo (1580–1645) was

published under the title Los suenos. Among these was ‘El sueno del

infierno’ (1608), a satirical description of Hell as recorded by an eye

witness who is said to have visited the infernal world in a dream, and now

wishes to enlighten his fellow men by relating the horrors he has seen. A

scholar, satirist, lyrical poet, novelist and a committed political, religious,

and ethical writer, Quevedo was one of the most diversely productive

writers of the Spanish Baroque. His early correspondence with the famous

Belgian humanist Justus Lipsius, his devotion to the Knights of Santiago,

and his prison time in San Marcos Castle in the city of Leon (1639–1643)

— all well-known biographical facts — only add to the complexity of the

picture, and to the perplexity of the scholar. Where (if it exists) is the

unifying feature of Quevedo’s utterly heterogenous literary production and

highly idiosyncratic personality to be found? Twentieth-century critical

reception of the Quevedean œuvre has either viewed its heterogenous

character as a direct expression of the author’s notoriously anxious and

protean personality — recurring thereby to empathy and extratextuality,

Orbis Litterarum 59: 416–438, 2004Printed in Denmark. All rights reserved

not explaining the literary texts as aesthetic phenomena, and exaggerating,

moreover, the negativity and darkness of Quevedo’s world1 – or it has, as a

reaction to the existentialist and negativist interpretations, concentrated on

revealing the endless number of intertextual references on which the

Quevedean writing is based, aiming at scientific objectivity, but not always

interpreting the actual use Quevedo made of his multiple sources —

thereby in the last analysis neglecting the problem of cohesion and

meaning altogether.2

The present article proposes a reading of ‘El sueno del infierno’ which

may clarify the connection between at least some of the diverse elements of

Quevedo’s strange world, concentrating on the relation between his

ubiquitous awareness of the arbitrarity of human language — separated

from divine truth after the Fall, and hence autonomous — and his quest

for authoritative metaphysical meaning. As will be shown subsequently,

Quevedo’s text deals with these important topics on a formal level via an

ingenious exploration of the sheer materiality of autonomous language in

Hell, and on a thematic level via the vivid metaphor of heresy. The text is

fundamentally concerned with the representation of an ever more distant

metaphysical truth. At the same time it is, however, as a result of the basic

awareness of the arbitrarity of language, on the verge of degenerating itself

into the very same sinful ‘fiction,’ hedonistic play or pure aesthetic form,

devoid of substantial metaphysical meaning, that is condemned as heresy

on a thematic level.

II. Dreams, Visions, and the Legitimacy of Aesthetic Form

The literary genre of dreams and visions of the Beyond is as old as Western

literature itself. In Homer’s Odyssey we find Odysseus travelling to Hades,

the Greek underworld, where he is to consult the blind seer Tiresias; in the

Politeia, Plato presents the myth of the soldier Er, who is brought to

the underworld by mistake as he lies wounded on the battlefield. As is also

the case in the dialogue Gorgias, Socrates tells about the Beyond to

illustrate the point that leading a just life pays off in the end, and that

(by analogy) it is indeed important that the state be built on the idea of

Justice. In the Timeaus, Plato answers affirmatively to the question,

already posed by Homer and subsequently by Aristotle, of whether dreams

417The Dialectics of Redemption

come from the gods, and are therefore divinatory. That God may enter

into communication with man through dreams is asserted in Numbers 12:6,

and still more explicitly in Job 33:14. Divine revelation through dreams

occurs frequently in both the Old and New Testaments. In most of the

cases recorded the dream is expressly said to come from God, e.g., the

dreams of Abimelech (Gen. xx,3), Jacob (Gen. xxviii,12; xxxi,10), Solomon

(IIIK. iii,5–15), Nabuchodonosor (Dan. ii,19), Daniel (Dan.vii,1), Joseph

(Matth. i,20; iii,13 and Paul (Acts xxiii,11; xxvii,23). The prophets Isaias

and Daniel describe the resurrection of the dead on the Last Day, and

Saint John the Evangelist tells of The Last Judgment in splendidly

figurative and visionary language in the Apocalypse. In the first century

C.E., Cicero employed the dream genre in Scipio’s Dream to make the

dead military general Scipio Africanus address his grandson Scipio the

Younger and teach him about politics. In the second century Lucian of

Samosate, to whom Quevedo is greatly indebted, wrote Menippus or The

Descent into Hades, in which the character Menippus visits the underworld

in a dream, as well as a number of Nekyomanteia (Dialogues of the Dead).

Virgil makes his hero Aeneas travel to the underworld in the Aeneid, and

around 1300 Virgil himself guides the pilgrim Dante through the three

worlds of the Beyond in the Divine Comedy. From the Middle Ages

onwards, a strong tradition of visionary literature flourished in Europe,

represented, for example, by St. Catherine of Sienna’s Dialogues, a series of

extatic visions of the Beyond, and culminating in the inspired writings of

the great Spanish mystics St. Teresa of Avila and St. John of the Cross,

representing in a richly metaphorical and visionary language their nuptials

with Christ. About 30 years later, in Shakespeare’s Hamlet, Macbeth, and

A Midsummer Night’s Dream, the dream is still an important means of

communication between the creatures of the Beyond and the living. In the

context of English literary history, Bunyun’s The Pilgrim’s Progress (1675)

is, however, probably the most obvious example of the connection between

Christian theological writing and the writing of dreams.3

Except maybe for his contemporaries Shakespeare and Bunyun, the

extraordinarily learned Quevedo surely knew all these important texts of

the Western literary canon as he composed his Suenos. As will be shown,

he consciously entered this literary tradition, and with earnestness

discussed its inherent problem of authority and authenticity: Does the

dream or vision come from God, is it more likely a human phantasm, or

418 Sofie Kluge

even a demonic illusion? What kind of legitimacy applies to the aesthetic

text representing phenomena of the Beyond? Already in Homer we meet

the conviction that there are two kinds of dreams: the prophetic and

benevolent ones sent by the gods, and the illusory and dangerous ones

which are not to be trusted. St. Bernhard of Clairvaux, preaching on the

Song of Songs in the twelfth century, makes a strikingly similar

observation, emphasizing that some of the dream-like images in the Song

and in the extatic visions of the numerous mystics are sent by God, while

others are send by the Evil One, and are therefore extremely dangerous.

Literary dreams and visions are consequently — in both the Graeco-

Roman and Judeo-Christian forms — characterized by the problem of the

aesthetic legitimacy: How is poetic language able to describe phenomena of

the Beyond?

In his Suenos, Quevedo continues this honourable tradition of combi-

ning metaphysical speculation with an acute investigation into the

legitimacy of aesthetic form, not only through the multifaceted exploration

of the materiality of autonomous language on a formal level, but also

through the rather choleric treatment of the problem of heresy on a

thematic level.

III. The Sinful Materiality of Autonomous Language

In the present context I will examine those formal characteristics of

Quevedo’s text that point to the central topics of the legitimacy of

aesthetic language, the sinful and fictiousness of signification after the

Fall, and the transcendence of divine truth. First, a quick glance at the

prologue — the most rude and aggressive prologue in the entire

collection of Suenos — will clearly demonstrate the narrator’s quite

stereotypical view of Man, alledgedly unwilling to lead a pious life and

to change his wicked ways:

Eres tan perverso que ni te obligue, llamandote pıo, benevolo, ni benigno en losdemas discursos por que no persiguieses; y, ya desenganado, quiero hablarcontigo claramente. (p. 141)

Having previously without any luck tried to improve on the perverso

reader by gentler means, flattering him in the preceding prologues as was

customary, the narrator’s tone now gets nasty. He eventually ends his


prologue by stating that he neither cares much about the reader nor about

his own text:

Al fin, si te agradare el discurso, tu te holgaras, y si no, poco importa, que a mıde ti, ni de el se me da nada. (1958, p. 141)

The discourse of Hell being thus properly introduced, the problem of the

legitimacy of the dream (and of literary dreams as aesthetic phenomenon)

is immediately posed, as the text refers to the common consensus that

dreams more often than not are illusive products of idle imagination (burla

de la fantasıa y ocio del alma), and that the devil never speaks the truth.

Given the apparent aim of improving the reader’s sinful behaviour by

representing in the tortures of hell in the dream, and given the infernal

denizens moralistic speeches, the tone of the introduction seems strange.

Not comprehensible in any other way, it must be seen as part of the general

discussion of aesthetic legitimacy in ‘El sueno del infierno,’ intially

relativizing the narrating discourse and pointing to the problem of

representational language:

Yo que en el Sueno del Juicio vi tantas cosas y en El alguacil endemoniado oıparte de lo que no habıa visto, como se que los suenos, las mas veces, son burlade la fantasıa y ocio del alma, y que el diablo nunca dijo verdad, por no tenercierta noticia de las cosas que justamente nos esconde Dios, vi, guiado del Angelde mi Guarda, lo que se sigue, por particular providencia de Dios, que fue paratraerme en el miedo la verdadera paz. (1958, p. 141)

The narrating voice thus presents itself as a wiser and more experienced

version of the figure experiencing the horrors of Hell. The relationship

between the two is essentially the same as the relationship between the

narrator and the pilgrim in the Divine Comedy. The narrating voice of

the prologue consequently represents the present state of mind of the

narrator, retrospectively relating his story with the attitude of a

desillusioned (desenganado) man wishing to enlighten his contemporaries.

The experience of desillusion (desengano) and mistrust of appearances

(enganos) of any kind, so characteristic of late Spanish Golden Age

mentality, and especially of Quevedo, now manifests itself as an acute

awareness of the illusory nature of language, including the aesthetic

language constituting ‘El sueno del infierno’ as a literary text. By the

initial reference to two other texts in the collection, ‘El sueno del Juicio

Final’ and ‘El alguacil endemoniado,’ the text sets off in an extremely

420 Sofie Kluge

self-conscious manner, demonstrating the awareness of the literary self —

literary, hence an aesthetic phenomenon or a fiction. The initial

relativization of the narrative discourse may be seen as an example of

negative dialectical aesthetics or (depending on the angle employed)

negative theology: self-reflexion or self-negation as a means of legitim-

izing the narration, and keeping the proper distance between represen-

tational language and the unattainable divine truth (‘las cosas que

justamente nos esconde Dios’) to be represented, so that the latter is not

obscured or blurred by deceitful human language. The fundamental

negative dialectical or negative theological intention of the text is stated

by the narrator’s comment that he was made to see the horrors of Hell

‘para traerme en el miedo la verdadera paz’– to be brought peace

through fear — a comment later echoed in Judas’ claim, that he

originated the salvation of mankind through his delivery of Christ (‘di

principio, en la entrega, a la medicina de vuestro mal,’ p. 154), and

advocating a basic dialectic of redemption: without the Fall of man, the

redemption through Christ would be meaningless. Similiarly, without evil

and deceit to be negated, negative theology would be left empty-handed

(divine truth being decisively out of reach). Finally, the same logic

applies, to negative dialectical aesthetics: without the immensity of

mythic fables to be negated, negative dialectical aesthetics would end up

silent, since the metaphysical truth ultimately aimed at is absolutely

sublime and hence unattainable beyond the indirect approach of

negativity. The basic negativity of ‘El sueno del infierno’ must be

understood as inextricably bound up with this ‘dialectic of redemption;’

its elaborate criticism of falseness is the only possible way of pointing at

transcendent divine truth.

Ya desengano, the narrator of the prologue is more experienced than

both the reader and the narrating figure of the discourse, and therefore

explicitly lays claim to authority on the part of his story. The initial

relativization of the narrative discourse, however, simultaneously points

to the fundamental tendency of the text to develop into illegitimate

fiction, devoid of any metaphysical meaning. Although the text from the

outset lays claim to divine authority (the narrator is said to be lead by a

guiding angel, and to see Hell ‘por particular providencia de Dios’), the

fundamental problem of legitimacy cannot be ignored. Literary dreams

and visions call into question the legitimacy of aesthetic language.


This problem introduced, the narrator now begins the story of how he

came to visit Hell. He was resting in a peaceful setting, when his thoughts

started to wander, moved as thoughts are by indolence and passion:

Halleme in un lugar favorecido de la naturaleza por el sosiego amable, donde sinmalicia la hermosura entretenıa la vista (muda creacion y sin respuesta humana),platicaban las fuentes entre las guijas y los arboles por las hojas; tal vez cantabaun pajaro, ni se determinadamente si en competencia suya o agradeciendoles suarmonıa.Ved cual es de peregrino nuestro deseo, que no halle paz en nada desto. Tendılos ojos, cudioso de ver algun camino, por donde buscar companıa, y veo (cosadigna de admiracion) dos sendas que nacian de un mismo lugar, y una se ibaapartando de la otra, como que huyesen de acompanarse. (1958 p. 141)

The general outlook of Quevedo’s text may be considerably illuminated by a

comparison with the opening lines of the Divine Comedy. Whereas the

pilgrim of the latter is initially on the verge of a nervous breakdown —

literally aswell asmetaphorically ‘in thewoods’— the narrator ofQuevedo’s

text is initially in what may be conceived of as the garden of Eden (‘un lugar

favorecido de la naturaleza’), or at least an uncorrupted natural paradise

(‘donde sinmalicia la hermosura entretenıa la vista’).WhereasDante’s epic is

the story of salvation and grace, Quevedo’s satire is the story of the Fall

without any immediate or direct redemption.WhereasDante is safely guided

through the three worlds of the Beyond (first by Virgil, then by Beatrice), the

narrator in Quevedo’s text soon loses his guardian angel, who is mentioned

shortly in the first lines of the discourse only to disappear immediately after,

and reappear just once for a brief and insignificant comment on page 147.

The mysterious disappearance of divine guidance in ‘El sueno del infierno’

mayverywell be seen as an expressionof the essential transcendenceof divine

truth, ever escaping the reach of man, and leaving him alone in the darkness

of negativity and materiality.

The narrator now has to face the old dilemma of choosing between the

unpleasant path of virtue and the comfortable path of vice. After a short

walk on the path of virtue, he is soon tempted by the festivities (‘bailes y

fiestas, juegos y saraos’) on the path of vice:

¡Pesia tal! – dije yo entre mı - , pues tras ser el camino tan trabajoso, es la genteque en el anda tan seca y poco entretenida. ¡Para mi humor es bueno! Di un pasoatras y salıme del camino del bien; que jamas quise retirarme de la virtud quetuviese mucho que desandar, ni que descansar. Volvı a la mano izquirda, y vi unacompanamiento tan reverento, tanto coche, tanta carroza cargarda de

422 Sofie Kluge

competencias al sol en humanas hermosuras, y gran cantidad de galas y libreas,lindos caballos, mucha gente de capa negra y muchos caballeros. Yo, que siempreoı decir: ‘‘Dıme con quien fueres y direte quien eres’’, por ir con buena companıa,puse el pie en el umbral del camino y, sin sentirlo, me halle respalado en medio deel, como el que se desliza por el hielo; y tope con lo que habıa menester. Porqueaquı todos eran bailes y fiestas, juegos y saraos… . (1958 p. 142)4

In fact, this passage may be seen as a meta-aesthetic comment on the

latent tendency of the text — fundamentally on a mission to enlighten

mankind through the exposition of sin — to degenerate into hedonistic

play with the inviting aesthetic material of the world (‘tanta carroza

cargada de competencias al sol de humanas hermosuras,’ etc.). Initially

following the exhausting path of virtue, and struggeling to reveal divine

truth through poetic language, the text now testifies to its own weakness

and vulnerability faced with the tempting and sinful voluptuousness of

the material world, and, by analogy, with the material voluptuousness

of autonomous aesthetic language. Like he who slips on ice (‘como el

que se desliza por el hielo’), the narrator is quickly led to the path of

vice, surrendering, that is, to the temptations of matter and to the

materiality of aesthetic language and giving up the representation of

metaphysical truth. From the cited passage may, then, be drawn the

important conclusion, that Hell is a place of form without substance,

meaningless and fallen language cut off from metaphysical meaning or

divine truth, and therefore likely to be falsely interpreted or even

manipulated by sinful Man. It is consequently, as will soon be clear, a

place of devilish mirth and witty wordplay of sinners toying with and

manipulating autonomous language, ultimately exploiting it to justify

their wickedness. Not realizing that it is exactly on the grounds of this

metaphysical emptiness and linguistic materiality that they are con-

demned to eternal torture in Hell, the sinners continuously try to justify

themselves and legitimize their sins by twisting language — a phenom-

enon which never fails to get a big laugh from the devils (‘y cada

palabra que hablaban se hundıan siete u ocho mil diablos de risa,’ p.

148).

Leaving now the problem of the narration and of the narrator, I will

examine some of the many examples of witty wordplay in the text,

emphasizing the extreme self-consciousness of the Quevedean writing, and

pointing to the arbitrariness of fallen language, separated from divine


truth, and hence interpretable in multiple ways. In each of the following

examples of linguistic gymnastics, the joke is based on the ambiguity and

multiple meaning of a central term or phrase:

� Abookseller complains that he is being condemned for the badworks of

others. The passage plays with the double meaning of the word obras,

meaning both ‘deeds’ and ‘literary works’: ‘Pues es tanta mi desgracia,

que todos se condenan por las malas obras que han hecho, y yo y todos

los libreros nos condenamos por las obrasmalas que hacen los otros’ (p.

145).

� When the narrator meets a group of entertainers (buffoons, clowns,

jesters, jokers, trickters and the like), the text plays with the double

meaning of the word gracia, meaning ‘grace’; in common usage,

however, the expression tener gracia means ‘to be funny’: ‘Y replique

como se condenaban, y me respondieron que como se condenan otros

por no tener gracia, ellos se condenan por tenerla o quererla tener’ (p.

146). While the condemnation of others is a question of the absence of

divine grace, the clowns are condemned to be fools for ‘having grace.’

� When the pastry-makers complain that they are being condemned for

the sin of the flesh, dealing mostly with food, and not with women, the

text plays with the double meaning of la carne, both ‘meat’ and ‘flesh’,

hinting at the common prejudice that pastry-makers substituted flies,

rats, and dog meat for more exquisite filling in the notoriously

unhealthy pasteles sold in the streets of Madrid: ‘¡Ay de nosotros –

dijo uno - , que nos condenamos por el pecado de la carne, sin conocer

mujer, tratando mas en huesos!’ (p. 147).

� It is said that a merchant is condemned for wanting to be like God,

and hence measureless: ‘Gente es esta – dijo al cabo muy enojado –

que quiso ser como Dios, pues pretendieron ser sin medida’ (p. 148).

The text plays with the word medida, comparable to the English word

‘measure,’ hinting at the common prejudice that merchants over-

charged their customers when weighing their goods in the dark

grocery shops, and hence were ‘without measure.’

� In the passage on the whores, a witty one presents the paradox that

while thieves are condemned for taking what doesn’t belong to them

(‘tomar lo ajeno’), women are condemned for giving away their own

(‘dar lo suyo’): ‘Decidnos senor, como ha de ser esto de dar y

424 Sofie Kluge

recibir: si los ladrones se condenan por tomar lo ajeno y la mujer

por dar lo suyo; aquı de Dios, que… el ser puta es ser justicia, si es

justicia dar a cada uno lo suyo, pues lo hacemos ası, ¿De que nos

culpan?’ (p. 155). The text plays with the phrase ‘dar lo suyo,’ which

in a Biblical context would mean ‘to give away one’s earthly

possessions,’ but taken literally may be interpreted as ‘to give away

one’s body.’

The text contains many more examples of the same kind. Another way the

text states the fundamental materiality of autonomous language can be

observed in the different groups of incarnated refrains, also explored by

Quevedo in the Cuento de cuentos. To this group belong the retrospectively

remorseful ¡Oh, quien hubiera!’ (p. 150), the naive ‘Penseque’ (p. 156), and

the scrupleless ‘Dios es piadoso’ (p. 150), always counting on God to

forgive their sins.

I will briefly consider the aesthetic structure of ‘El sueno del infierno’,

primarily its overtly polyphonic character, and secondly its structural logic

of parataxis, enummeration or accumulation — structural phenomena

which must necessarily be related to the central topic of the legitimacy of

aesthetic language.

The polyphonic nature of the text manifests itself in the multitude of

infernal voices made to speak, complain, joke, defend themselves, preach

and moralize all through it. Essentially a result of the ‘weak’ narrative

position, initially relativized as previously described, the polyphony of

voices basically attests to the problem of legitimacy, as the self-conscious

narrator is only just able to prevent his own story from developing into a

genuine cacophony of independent statements. With the authority of the

narrative voice intially relativized by the emphasis on its own fictionality,

the text virtually presents itself as a loosely orchestrated chorus work, led

by the allegedly authoritative voice of the narrator, blessed by divine

providence and out to represent divine truth, but, as the preceding

examples of linguistic gymnastics demonstrate, not entirely able to prevent

his own discourse from degenerating into mere play.

To this description must be added the observation that Quevedo’s text is

fundamentally structured according to the logic of what one may call non-

systematic accumulation or enumeration, i.e. a strictly paratactic, non-

hierarchic order of phenomena. Beyond the logic of the parataxis, it is


indeed difficult to find any other structural principle in ‘El sueno del

infierno.’ Tailors, lawyers, buffoons, theologians, pharmacists, cuckolds,

merchants, vain ladies, coachmen, homosexuals, hypocrites, officials,

booksellers, duenas (old women guarding the decency of young girls),

noblemen, whores, innkeepers, and pie-makers — all of seventeenth-

century Madrid — are presented paratactically without any obvious

principle of differentiation. All represent empty and sinful worldviews,

segregated from divine truth, manipulating purely instrumental language,

and pleading their innocence. Quevedo surely has an acute sense of this

negative development since the good old days in Paradise, when Adam

gave each animal a name that corresponded exactly to its nature. His text

may very well be seen as fundamentally oriented towards this Adamic ideal

as the basic motivation and background for the investigation into the

legitimacy of language. The formal qualities just examined, however — as

well as the thematic treatment of heresy to be examined succeedingly —

certainly reveal an intimate kinship of ‘El sueno del infierno’ with the fallen

and autonomous, instrumental and arbitrary language of Hell. One can

only agree with Raimundo Lida when he describes Quevedo’s oneiric

visions with phrases such as ‘immense stream of words’, ‘torrential

enumeration’, and ‘frenetic movement of the discourse’, resulting in an

evident ‘losing sight of the point of departure’, and ‘the steady accumu-

lation of more and more images and ideas.’5 Not unlike the empty

discourses of the sinners in Hell, Quevedo’s text is, then, potentially

developing into what may be thought of as a case of signification run riot.

Thus, it may be said to be hopelessly far from the Adamic language of

Paradise, indirectly posed as a linguistic ideal through the criticism of

autonomous language on the one hand, and through the criticism of heresy

on the other hand.

IV. The Problem of Heresy

I will examine three groups of sinners in Hell: the scientific, literary and

religious heretics. Quevedo’s censure aims at the immense number of false

teachings that obscure the decisively transcendent, yet still authoritative

divine truth. As such, ‘El sueno del infierno’ may again to a certain extent

be viewed as an expression of the dialectics of redemption inherent in

negative theology and in negative dialectics as the basic idea that sin is only

426 Sofie Kluge

the reverse side of redemption, and that the negation of falseness,

consequently, amounts to an indirect representation of truth. However, the

text is not to be described as an unproblematic example of negative

dialectics or negative theology, protecting a metaphysical truth by

uncompromisingly exhibiting the wickedness of human signification. As

will become clear, I think, from the present reading of the passages in

question, the text is marked by a notable tendency to lose itself in the sinful

heretical fictions as a colourful and exotic aesthetic material to be

passionately explored, losing track of the transcendent truth as a divine

light leading through the labyrinth of falseness and sin — a tendency

corresponding to that towards aesthetic play on a formal level.

The first group in the pandemonium of heretics on trial are the

scientists of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries with their esoteric

discussions:

Eran astrologos y alquimistas. Estos andaban llenos de hornos y crisoles, delodos, de minerales, de escorias, de cuernos, de estiercol, de sangre humana, depolvos y de alambiques. Aquı calcinaban, allı lavaban, allı apartaban y acullapurificaban. Cual estaba fijando el mercurio al martillo, y, habiendo resuelto lamateria viscosa y ahuyentado la parte sutil, lo corruptivo del fuego, enllegandose a la copela, se le iba en humo. Otros disputaban si se habıa de darfuego de mecha, o si el fuego o no fuego de Raimundo habıa de entenderse de lacal o si de luz efectiva del calor, y no de calor efectivo de fuego. Cuales con elsigno de Hermete daban principio a la obra magna, y en otra parte miraban ya elnegro blanco, y le aguardaban colorado; y juntando a esto la proporcion denaturaleza, con naturaleza se contenta naturaleza, y con ella misma se ayuda, ylos demas oraculos ciegos suyos, esperaban la reduccion de la prima materia, yal cabo reducıan su sangre a la postrera podre; y en lugar de hacer el estiercol,cabellos, sangre humana, cuernos y escoria, oro; hacıan del oro estiercol,gastandolo neciamente. (p. 158)

Parodying the terminology and the discussions of the alchemists with the

exactitude of the adept, Quevedo demonstrates an intimate and accurate

knowledge of this heretical science,6 adding still more to the impressive

amount of learning emanating from the pages of his Suenos. Shortly after,

the other main branch of contemporary science, astrology, is treated in a

similarly parodic manner along with chiromantics and geomantics:

Al otro lado no era menos la trulla de astrologos y supersticiosos. Unquiromantico iba tomando las manos a todos los otros que se habıancondenado, diciendo - ¡Que claro que se ve que se habıan de condenar estos,por el monte de Saturno! Otro que estaba a gatas con un compas, mediendo


alturas y notando estrellas, cercado de efemerides y tablas, se levanto y dijo enaltas voces: - vive Dios, que si me pariera mi madre medio minuto antes, que mesalvo: porque Saturno en aquel punto, mudaba el aspecto y Marte se pasaba a lacasa de la vida, el escorpion perdıa su malicia, y yo, como di en procurador,fuera pobre mendigo. Otro tras el andaba diciendo a los diablos que lemortificaban que mirasen bien si era verdad que el habıa muerto; que no podıaser, a causa que tenıa a Jupiter por ascendente, y a Venus en la casa de la vida,sin aspecto ninguno malo, y que era fuerza que viviese noventa anos. Miren —decıa —: que les notifico que miren bien si sy difunto, porque por mi cuenta esimposible que pueda ser esto. En esto iba y venıa, sin poderlo nadie sacar deaquı. Y para enmendar la locura destos, salio otro, geomantico, poniendose enpunto con las ciencias, haciendo sus doce casas gobernadas por el impulso de lamano y rayas a imitacion de los dedos, con supersticiosas palabras y oracion… .(p. 159)

In both cases, Quevedo’s profound knowledge of the object of his

parody shines forth, and suggests a strong fascination with the heretical

discourses treated. Still more names of famous heretical scholars, such as

the mystic philosopher Cornelius Agrippa of Nettesheim, the anatomist

Paracelsus, the humanist Julius Caesar Scaliger (Aristotelian and

adversary of Erasmus, author of Poetices libri VII, 1561), and the

anonymous author of the Clavicula Salmonis (a legendary book on how

to open the gates of the Beyond) are added to the list. The scientific

heretics represent fictional world views blurring the divine truth with

false teaching, and even undermining the holy Catholic religion by

secretely associating with the devil at occult nocturnal rituals. On the

one hand, Quevedo’s harsh criticism of heresy is (in accordance with the

logic of negative theology and negative dialectics) fundamentally

motivated by a reverence for the transcendent and authoritative divine

truth to be revealed through the aesthetic language of the text. On the

other hand, the criticism of heresy tends to lose track of its aim,

exploring with an almost demonical delight the infinite number of

fascinating heretical fictions as colourful and exotic aesthetic material,

thereby itself potentially becoming a delirious, hedonistic and sinful

fiction paradoxically akin to the heresy explicitly and repeatedly

condemned by the narrator. In other words, although Quevedo’s text

zealously seeks to keep track of divine truth by clinging to a negative

theological criticism of heresy, all the same — as a result of an

irrepressible fascination with the voluptuous material treated — it is

about to degenerate into uncontrolable signification or mere aesthetic

428 Sofie Kluge

play, devoid of the immediate metaphysical meaning it initially promised

to reveal. In this sense, the text can be seen as a deconstruction, or even

a refutation, of negative theology and of negative dialectics, exhibiting

its latent tendency towards sheer metaphysical negativity. From a

different perspective, however, this tendency may be seen as that of the

text to catch the contagious disease of fictionality, leaving its original

theological mission, and, potentially, leaping into the great abyss of

unpreoccupied aestheticism — a capital sin in the context of a

metaphysically rooted aesthetic.

The connection between metaphysical negativity and aestheticism

becomes clear from the criticism of another important group in ‘El sueno

del infierno’, namely the literary heretics. Quevedo was a notorious enemy

of the literary phenomenon known as culteranismo, a term designating a

highly stylized school of poetics, while at the same time phonetically

evoking the religious heresy of luteranismo. Originally the idiosyncratic

and highly sophisticated style of the great Spanish poet Luis de Gongora,

and hence also known as gongorismo, culteranism soon degenerated into

aestheticism at the hands of epigones, and became the target of much

criticism, aiming primarily at the characteristic coinage of artificial words

and phrases (cultismos), derived from Latin, Greek, Italian, and even

Tuscan. Among the critics of culteranism, Quevedo distinguished himself

by the method of his attack, launched in the guise of satirical texts aping

the culturanist style, thus proving him simultaneously an equal of

Gongora himself in manipulating poetic language. In the present text

the culteranist preoccupation with aesthetic form and witty wordplay

(conceptos) is exaggerated to an extreme so as to exhibit its innate, sinful

emptiness:

¿Conceptos gastais aun estando aquı? Buenos cascos teneis - dije yo. Cuandouno entre todos, que estaba aherrojado y con mas penas que todos, dijo: -¡Plegue a Dios, hermano, que ası se vea el que invento los consonantes! Puesporque en un soneto

Dije que una senora era absolutay siendo mas honesta que Lucreciapor dar fin al cuarteto, la hice puta.

Forzome el consonante a llamar neciaa la de mas talento y mas brıo:¡Oh, ley de consonantes dura y recia!


Habiendo en un terceto dicho lıo,un hidalgo afrente tan solamenteporque el verso acabo bien en judıo.

A Herodes otra vez llame inocentemil veces a lo dulce dije amargoy llame al apacible impertinente.

Y por el consonante tengo a cargootros delitos torpes, feos, rudos;y llega mi proceso a ser tan largo,Que, porque en una octava dije escudos,hice, sin mas ni mas, siete maridoscon honradas mujeres, ser cornudos.

Aquı nos tienen, como ves, metidosy por el consonante condenados.¡Oh, mıseros poetas desdichados,a puros versos, como ves, perdidos!

¡Hay tan graciosa locura, - dije yo - , que, aun aquı estais sin dejarla nidescansaros della! ¡Oh, que vi de ellos! Y decıa un diablo: - Esta es gente quecanta sus pecados como otros los lloran, pues en amancebandose, con hacerlapastora o mora, la sacan a la verguenza en un romancico por todo el mundo. Silas quieren a sus damas, lo mas que les dan es un soneto o unas octavas, y si lasaborrecen o las dejan, lo menos que les dejan es una satira. ¡Pues que es verloscargados de pradicos de esmeraldas, de cabellos de oro, de perlas de la manana,de fuentes de cristal, sin hallar sobre todo esto dinero para una camisa ni sobresu ingenio! Y es gente que apenas se conoce de que ley son. Porque el nombre esde cristianos, las almas de herejes, los pensamientos de alarbes y las palabras degentiles. - Si mucho me aguardo - dije entre mı -, yo oire also que me pese. (p.156 f.)

The heretic poets in Hell have sacrificed substance to form ‘por el

consonante condenados,’ and ‘a puros versos perdidos’ as one of them

honestly confesses,7 caring more about formal matters of rhyme and

alliteration than about the truth to be revealed through poetic language.

As when the pilgrim Dante becomes uneasy at meeting in the Inferno the

father of his former friend and spiritual companion, a famous dolce stil

nuovo poet, Quevedo’s pilgrim quickly abandons the conversation with the

heretic poets, afraid to learn something that might concern himself (‘Si

mucho me aguardo - dije entre mı -, yo oire algo que me pese’). Revealing

the connection between metaphysical negativity and aestheticism, this

passage also seems to suggest a deconstruction of negative theology as the

guardian of divine truth, revealing its latent tendency towards sheer

430 Sofie Kluge

negativity and immanent danger of developing into aestheticism, which is

highly suspicious in the context of Christian aesthetics, and most

intimately related to the capital sin of vanity, explicitly condemned in

the emblematic passage on the ugly women (‘las feas,’ p. 153), made up to

look pretty on the outside, but ultimately nothing more than deceiving

appearances. On the surface a condemnation of heresy (the poets are said

to have the souls of heretics, ‘almas de herejes’), the text reveals its own

intimate kinship with the object of its criticism by aping the linguistic

cosmetics and witty wordplay of the culteranists.8

Furthermore, Quevedo’s text again touches on the central question of

aesthetic legitimacy, as the passage about the literary heretics takes up the

prominent tradition of separating art from true beauty. The artist Plato’s

criticism of non-philosophical art in the dialogue Ion, in Laws 7, and (most

importantly) in the Politeia, books 2–3 and 10 — naively misinterpreted as

the rigid philosopher’s rejection of art altogether — is an obvious

precursor of the artist Quevedo’s criticism of non-theologic art in ‘El sueno

del infierno,’ as is the artist Cervantes’ criticism of non-reflective romance

in Don Quixote (the first part of which was published in 1605, only three

years before Quevedo wrote his text). Many intermediary examples —

Graeco-Roman as well as Judeo-Christian — of the separation of art and

true beauty can be detected in between. Some time after Quevedo, in the

eighteenth century, an echo of it is heard in Kant’s important concept of

aesthetic Intentionslosigkeit. In the twentieth century, Quevedo’s greatest

modern heir, the Argentine writer Jorge Luis Borges, simultaneously

continued and rebelled against it, entitling his most famous work Ficciones,

and ultimately depriving its elegant and learned texts of any metaphysical

legitimacy, while at the same time underlining their artificial and purely

aesthetic beauty. Notwithstanding the geographical and temporal distan-

ces between the two, both writers were acutely aware of the problem of

aesthetic legitimacy. Turning to the dogmatic side, the separation of art

and true beauty can be traced in a variety of positions, from Christianity to

Marxism, emphasizing the moral and ethical responsibility of art and the

ultimate decadence of aestheticism. Among the historically most important

examples of dogmatic Christian criticism of art are St. Jerome’s conviction

that poetry is the feed of demons (Epist. ad Damasum XXI,13.4), St.

Augustine’s criticism of mythological fables (Confess. I,16; De civitate Dei,

II,8), and Boethius’ condemnation of the Muses (De Consolatione


Philosophiae, I,1). Quevedo’s text may — with its explicit criticism of the

literary heresy of aestheticism — be seen as a pair with the latter position;

its ambiguity towards this same heresy, and its already demonstrated

tendency to develop into aesthetic play itself, however, also makes it a

possible champion of the former position. Most of all, ‘El sueno del

infierno’ seems to discuss the problem of aesthetic legitimacy, ultimately

not offering any definitive answers, but analyzing the different aspects of

the question on a formal as well as on a thematic level.

The problem of legitimacy is not only treated in its relation to science

and to aesthetics. The treatment of the religious heretics demonstrates an

extended knowledge of heathen religions, introducing through the central

figure of Judas a new perspective, namely the problem of rhetoric: with the

awareness of the arbitrarity of autonomous language follows an awareness

of the power of rhetoric as linguistic manipulation. First, however, a short

glance at the colourful pandemonium of religious heretics. An impressive

list of religious phenomena, comparable only to the ennumeration of

scientific heretics, is presented with a notable delight in the monstrousity

and depravity of the subject matter described:

Estaba luego Aspad el autor de los Saducceos. Los fariseos estaban aguardandoa Cristo, no como Dios, sino como hombre. Estaban los Eliogaristasdevictıacos, adoradores del sol; pero los mas graciosos son los que veneran lasranas, que fueron plaga Faraon, por ser azote de Dios. Estaban los musoritashaciendo ratonera al arca a puro raton de oro. Estaban los que adoraron laMosca accaronita: Ocıas, el que quiso pedir a una mosca antes salud que a Dios,por lo cual Elias le castigo. Estaban los trogloditas, los de la fortuna del cielo, losde Baal, los de Astarot, los del ıdolo Moloch y Renfan, de la ara de Tofet, losputeoritas, herejes veraniscos de pozos, los de la serpiente de metal. Y entretodos sonaba la baraunda y el llanto de las judias, que, debajo de tierra, en lascuevas, lloraban a Thamar en su simulacro. Seguıan los Bahalitas, luego laPitonisa arremangada, y detras los de Ashtar y Astharot, y al fin los queaguardaban a Herodes, y desto se llaman herodianos. Y hube a todos estos porlocos y menticatos. (p. 160)

After seeing many other exotic heretics of the same kind, including among

others Basilides of Alexandria, Menander of Samaria, the Spaniard

Priscilla from the fourth century C.E., and the infamous, sexually liberated

empress Barbara (‘llamando necias a las virgenes,’ p. 161), ruling over the

devils and preaching the gospel of vanity (‘decıa que morıa el alma y el

cuerpo,’ p. 161), the narrator finally meets the worst of all heretics, the

founders of the other great religions. First, Mohammed is questioned

432 Sofie Kluge

about why Moslems cannot eat pork and drink alcohol, both products so

dear to the Spanish in the form of jamon and vino. Then, closest to Lucifer

himself in his infernal cave furnished with human bodies, the Protestant

heretics Calvin, Luther, Beza (friend and successor of Calvin), and

Melanchton, who are joined by the alleged atheist Joseph Scaliger.

Luther is approached by the narrator for his iconoclasm — a central

part of the passage on the religious heretics, easy to relate to the text’s

discussion of the legitimacy of aesthetic language, seeing that the image

(like the literary text) is fundamentally a representational instrument. The

problem of imagery and the worshipping of images was a crucial point in

the great schism between Catholics and Protestants, loaded with ideolo-

gical significance, and essentially carrying on the old debate on idolatry of

Byzantine times. Whereas the Protestants, continuing basically the line of

the iconoclast emperors Leo III and his son Constantine V of Constan-

tinople, condemned the comfort of pictorical representation (and, conse-

quently, the comfort of the Saints and of the Pope as incarnations or

human ‘images’ of the divine),9 the Catholics, following the defenders of

holy images (Emperor Germanus I, Popes Gregorius II-III, and St. John

Damascene), retained worship of images to a certain extent, depending on

the fundamental distinction between orthodox iconographical representa-

tion and idolatry, and on the strict control hereof carried out by the

Inquisition from the twelfth century to well into the eighteenth century.

Quevedo’s anxious inquiry into the legitimacy of representational language

must necessarily be understood on this ecclesiastico-historical background,

and his peculiar attention to the Lutheran policy on images must be seen as

a typical expression of his astonishing ability to pinpoint the essence of

ideological (theological) conflicts, relating them to aesthetics. Again, the

text may be seen to have a certain kinship with the heresy condemned: the

negative theological or dialectical intention of ‘El sueno del infierno’

considered, Quevedo’s strict policy on aesthetic imagery may not vary

considerably from Luther’s, with the important distinction that Quevedo

does fundamentally (following orthodox Catholic policy on these matters)

allow images, but submits them to rigid control.

Like poetic language, images must, according to orthodox Catholism, be

allowed, but as controlled by ecclesiastical authority. A previous passage,

describing the narrator’s meeting with another infamous man, Judas

Iscariot, demonstrates why this must be so, in a Catholic or any other


dogmatic world view. In ‘El sueno del infierno’ Judas is presented as the

supreme manipulator of language:

Y ası, llegandome cerca, le dije: ¿Como, traidor infame sobre todos los hombres,vendiste a tu Maestro, a tu Senor y a tu Dios por tan poco dinero?A lo cual respondio:—Pues vosotros ¿Por que os querais deso? Que sobrado de bien os estuvo, puesfue el remedio y arcaduz para vuestra salud. Yo soy el que me he de quejar y fuıa quien le estuvo mal; y ha habido herejes que me han tenido veneracion, porquedi principio, en la entrega, a la medicina de vuestro mal. (p. 154)

The treachery of Judas would appear to every Christian to be the most

mysterious and unintelligible of sins. For how could one chosen as a disciple,

and enjoying the grace of the apostolate and the privilege of intimate

friendship with Christ, be tempted to such gross ingratitude for the paltry

price of 30 pieces of silver? By any standards the crime is so incredible, both in

itself and in all its circumstances, that it is no wonder that many attempts

have been made to give some more intelligible explanation of its origin and

motives, and that the problem presented by Judas and his treachery has been

the subject of strange and startling theories. Judas’s comment, that heretics

have venerated him as ‘la medicina de vuestro mal,’ does in fact correspond

to the strange view held by the early Gnostic sect known as the Cainites

described by St. Irenaeus (Adv. Haer., I,c), and more fully by Tertullian

(Praesc. Haeretic., xlvii), and St. Epiphanius (Haeres., xxxviii). Certain of

these heretics, whose opinion has been revived by some modern writers in a

more plausible form,10 maintained that Judas was really enlightened, and

acted as he did in order that mankind might be redeemed by the death of

Christ. For this reason they regarded him as worthy of gratitude and

veneration. In ‘El sueno del infierno’, Quevedo uses the Gnostic argument

about Judas’s crucial part in the redemption of mankind to demonstrate the

power of rhetoric to blur divine truth. Provided that Judas is in Hell, he

cannot be regarded as meriting veneration, and seeing that Gnosticism was

condemned as heresy by authorities such as St. Irenaeus and Tertullian, the

theory of his piety cannot be true. More likely, the passage is yet another

contribution to the text’s discussion of legitimacy, this time posing the

problem of rhetoric as intimately connected with the arbitrariness of

language. Judas’s rhetorically brilliant self-defence, cleverly twisting the

scriptural testimonies of the Gospels, demonstrates the necessity of

Quevedo’s criticism: heretics are not just mad scientists, decadent poets or

434 Sofie Kluge

maniacs with exotic creeds; they are potential demagogues spreading false

teachings and obscuring divine truth. The basic critical intention of ‘El sueno

del infierno’ is consequently justified. Like Plato’s fierce criticism of the

Sophists’ manipulation of language, Quevedo’s criticism of the heretic

fictions is fundamentally motivated by his essentialist concept of a

transcendent, yet still authoritative divine truth, and moved by the

conviction that heresy is after all not just an exotic and entertaining, but

also a very dangerous phenomenon, abominable in themost immediate sense

because of its seductiveness. Still, as was the case with the other passages on

heresy, the passage on Judas demonstrates a certain ambivalence, as the

‘traidor infame sobre todos los hombres’ is allowed quite a long passus to

defend himself. Again, the text seems to point to the narrator’s latent

fascination with heresy as a spell-binding and colourful phenomenon,

endlessly producing the most extravagant and dazzling fictions.

V. Conclusion

In the previous reading I have tried to show how the thematic treatment of

the topic of heresy in ‘El sueno del infierno’ is characterized by a deep

ambivalence towards the object in question: on the one hand, the heretical

fictions were explicitly and repeatedly condemned by the narrator; on the

other hand the text was seen to demonstrate an obvious fascination, and —

as an aesthetic text fundamentally a fiction itself — a possible kinship with

them. As has been argued, the same ambivalence applies to the exploration

of autonomous language on a formal level, manifest in the demonstratively

self-conscious and self-relativizing narrative voice, in the witty word-play,

in the polyphony of infernal voices, and finally in parataxis as predom-

inating structural logic, constituting Quevedo’s pervasive preoccupation

with the legitimacy of aesthetic language. Thus characterized by an acute

awareness of the arbitrarity of language and a conspicuous sense of the

sinfulness of signification after the Fall, the text introduces itself as an

inquisitorial tribunal trying an infinite number of heretics by way of a

negative theological or dialectical criticism, restlessly concerned with

keeping the transcendent divine truth free of false interpretation. In the

process of investigating the legitimacy of language, however, the innate

tendency of the text to lose track of transcendent truth and develop into

sheer metaphysical negativity and unpreoccupied aestheticism was


revealed — making it virtually impossible to distinguish ‘El sueno del

infierno’ itself from the sinful and theologically ‘empty’ fictions of the

heretics. This fundamental ambivalence as to the question of the legitimacy

of aesthetic language is deeply rooted in literary dreams and visions,

always under suspicion of being mere human illusion, or even delusion —

the work of the Devil.

As to the question of cohesion or unity of the Quevedean œuvre posed in

the introduction, I think that the problem of the legitimacy of aesthetic

language may be seen as the central axis around which the Quevedean

universe revolves. Indefatigably investigating possible means of represent-

ing transcendent metaphysical truth, which might redeem sinful Man and

re-transform his fallen language into ideal Adamic naming, Quevedo

virtually explored the whole Graeco-Roman and Judeo-Christian cultural

history, and employed a multiplicity of literary forms. His learned mind was

deeply characterized, however, by an inescapable mistrust (desengano) of

appearances, and every aesthetic form employed was eventually found to be

inadequate, erroneous, fictitious, and even sinful, not representing divine

truth in a satisfactory manner, and possibly even obscuring it with false

interpretation. To calm the tension and ease the pain of this extremely

polarized universe, Quevedo proposes what one may call a dialectic of

redemption, emphasizing (according to the logic of negative dialectics and

theology) the crucial role of deceit and sin in the redemption of Mankind.

However, as the preceding analysis of the topic of the legitimacy of

language in ‘El sueno del infierno’ has proved, advocating this dialectic of

redemption is indeed a very precarious intellectual stance to take. The

combination of the absolute transcendence of divine truth and the

tempting nature of voluptuous matter and of autonomous language all

too easily lead to sheer metaphysical negativity and unpreoccupied

aestheticism.11 Thus, it may be said that Quevedo’s text makes manifest a

schism between a metaphysically oriented spirituality and a hedonistic

worldliness, essentially reflecting the basic, conflicting aspects of the

Spanish Baroque.

NOTES

1. Important existentialist and ‘negativist’ readings of Quevedo are e.g. D. Alonso’sinterpretation IN: Poesıa espanola (Madrid, 1971); J.L. Borges, Quevedo, IN: Otrasinquisiciones (Madrid, 1993) and Foreword to Los Suenos, IN: G. Sobejano (ed.),

436 Sofie Kluge

Francisco de Quevedo (Madrid, 1978); R. Lida, Prosas de Quevedo (Barcelona, 1981);I. Nolting-Hauff, Vision, satira y agudeza en los Suenos de Quevedo (Madrid, 1974).

2. An important example of this most recent Quevedo reception is P.J. Smith,Quevedo on Parnassus. Allusive Context and Literary Theory in the Love Lyric(London, 1987), whose opposition to the existing existentialist and negativistreception is quite explicit. A. Cullhed also traces intertextual references in hisDiktens tidsrymd. Studier i Francisco de Quevedo och hans tid (Stockholm, 1995),with the aim of analyzing the concept of time in Quevedo’s love lyric.

3. I owe this observation to Thomas Rockwell, who made me aware of the similaritybetween the opening lines of The Pilgrim’s Progress (‘As I walked through thewilderness of this world, I lighted on a certain place where was a den, and laid medown in that place to sleep; and as I slept, I dreamed a dream. […]’) and theopening lines of El sueno del infierno.

4. The choice between the path of virtue and the path of vice goes back to Xenophon’sMemorabilia 2.1.21 ff., in which the allegory (attributed to the Sophist Prodicus) ofthe hero Hercules’ choice between virtue and vice is related. The allegory later onreceived a Christian interpretation crucial to Quevedo’s use of it in ‘El sueno delinfierno.’ Quevedo was surely also influenced, however, by Lucian’s The Dream orLucian’s Career, an autobiographical adaptation of the Hercules-allegory.

5. Cf. R. Lida, op.cit., p. 236: ‘Inmensa corriente de palabras, […] la burla al per-sonaje, el placer de la enumeracion torrencial, […] desencadenada enumeracion […]movimiento frenetico del discurso […] perdiendo a veces de vista […] el punto departida y enhebrando mas y mas imagenes e ideas.’

6. See also on this topic, A. Martinengo, Quevedo e il simbolo alchimistico. Tre studi.(Padua, 1967).

7. This wording in fact echoes the famous opening lines of Luis de Gongoras Soledadprimera, which reads (my italics):Pasos de un peregrino son errantecuantos me dicto versos dulce Musain Soledad confusaperdidos unos, otros inspirados.

Quevedo’s polemic on culteranist aestheticism in ‘El sueno del infierno’ may inci-dentally be seen as a virtual homage to Lucian’s The Consonants at Law. Sigma vs.Tau in the Court of the Seven Vowels.

8. The passage on the vain nobleman, caring only about his lineage (p. 148 f.), mayalso be seen in this context. The succeeding sermon on the vanity of la nobleza, lahonra and la valentıa (nobility, honor and courage), given by one of the devils andimbued with Quevedean desengano, may consequently be, at least indirectly or byanalogy, applied to the cases of the aestheticist poets and the made up women.

9. Cf. The Catholic Encyclopedia (http://www.newadvent.org/cathen), the article onIconoclasm.

10. Cf., e.g., J.L. Borges, Tres versiones de Judas, In Ficciones (1944).11. The question of the dialectic of redemption (and, consequently, of negative theology

and negative dialectics), I think, was whatWalter Benjamin ultimately aimed at in hisimportant analysis ofBaroque allegory inUrsprung des deutschenTrauerspiels (1925).Benjamin’s description of the innate tendency of allegory towards sheermetaphysicalnegativity and unpreoccupied aestheticism, of the connection between allegory and


critical reason, and, finally, of the transformation of vanity-ridden allegory intorevealed theological symbol through dialectical apotheosis, decisively points in thisdirection.

REFERENCES

Francisco de Quevedo. 1958, Obras completas I.Prosa. Madrid, Aguilar.Alonso, Damaso. 1971, Poesıa espanola. Madrid, Gredos.Borges, Jorge Luis. 1993, Otras Inquisiciones. Madrid, Alianza.Cullhed, Anders. 1995, Diktens tidsrymd. Studier i Francisco de Quevedo och hans tid.

Stockholm, Symposion.Lida, Raimundo. 1981, Prosas de Quevedo. Barcelona, Crıtica.Martinengo, Alessandro. 1967, Quevedo e il simbolo alchimistico.Tre studi. Padua,

Liviana.Nolting-Hauff, Ilse. 1974, Vision, satira y agudeza en los ’Suenos’ de Quevedo. Madrid:

Gredos.Smith , Paul Julian. 1987, Quevedo on Parnassus. Allusive Context and Literary Theory

in the Love Lyric. London, The Modern Humanities Research Association.Sobejano, Gonzalo. ed. 1978, Francisco de Quevedo. Madrid, Taurus.

Sofie Kluge. Born 1975. Doctoral student of the University of Copenhagen, with aproject on Spanish Baroque drama as non-classical form. University gold medal winnerin 2003 for a dissertation on the reception of Cervantes’s Don Quixote.

438 Sofie Kluge

infierno en francisco de quevedo

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